The Antidote to Character Data Sheets: Sarah's List of Stuff to Do

I roundly condemned the Character Data Sheets a couple of days ago, because they concentrated on superficial characteristics rather than character - the What not the Who.  

I believe that, in real life as in fiction, character is revealed through action so rather than a list of 'what was your first pet called' questions, here is a list of things that you could get your character to DO...aka Sarah's List of Stuff to Do.

Make your character…

- Wait at a bus stop, an airport, a station, for a job interview, for a doctor’s appointment

- Eat a meal…alone, with friends, with a lover, with a parent, in a restaurant, in a café, on a park bench, at the office, on a train

- Take a journey by car, lorry, taxi, train, bus, coach, bicycle, horse, jet, plane, boat, ferry, Take some exercise – aerobics, yoga, walk, tennis, golf, football

- Go out to the cinema, club, winebar alone or with friends

- Get a letter/parcel in the post, send an important letter

- Get stuck in traffic on the way to job interview, first date, meeting with lawyer

- Look for a new job in a newspaper, shop window, small ads, job centre

- Interact with an animal – stroke a cat, bitten by a hamster, walk the dog, kill a chicken

- Go to the library, buy a newspaper, do a tax return

- Prepare some food, clean the house, do some gardening

- Watch television, read a book, read a magazine

- Make something with fabric, wood, paper

- Go shopping for clothes for a camping trip, a school reunion, a week in Tuscany

- Phone someone up and complain about something, receive a phone call selling something

- Spend half an hour googling

- Write a diary, a short story, a letter to their best friend, a letter to a hero, a postcard to a lover, a Valentine’s day card

- Have a birthday alone, with friends, with family

Have fun! 

Characters Need to Do, Not Sit Around Talking and Thinking

A friend passed this saying to me "We judge ourselves by our intentions, others by their actions," which anyone who meant to get a loved one an Easter Egg but forgot will understand.  Even though one of the delights of reading prose is that we can know what a character is thinking, and therefore know their motivations, we will still judge the character by their actions.  

Characters who sit around and do nothing will be judged as not interesting.  This is especially true when we first meet them - after all, who wants to read about someone who does nothing?  It's very important that when your character first turns up they are doing something.  

But what?  The temptation is to show them doing something dramatic - rescuing babies from a burning building perhaps, or foiling some dastardly deed. I once read the opening to a first novel which started with a gin palace being blown up, killing all the occupants.  It was, I suppose, exciting but given that the only thing that defined the characters was the single quality of being in smithereens, it was hard to engage with them.  

Instead, show your character doing a straightforward action.  One of the best actions to start with is to show them making a choice, even if it's something as ordinary as choosing between Braeburn and Pink Lady apples at the supermarket, but any action will do.  The thing to avoid is the character talking or thinking about doing something.  To quote another saying: Actions speak louder than words.

The Plot Generator

A character sits an exam. There are two outcomes: Pass or Fail.

Write two lists: what might happen next if they pass, and what might happen if they fail. use your imagination - go conventional, go wild, it doesn't matter.

Choose one outcome from the Pass list and write another list of what might happen next.

Choose one outcome from the Fail list and write another list of what might happen next.

Carry on doing this until you get bored/run out of paper.

Your lists should have a mixture of positive and negative outcomes. Trace a story path from the lists eg X fails the exam, they don't get the job, they lose their home, they die in poverty. Or...X passes the exam, they win the job, they become mega successful, everyone loves them.

The first story line is a line of negative outcomes, the second is nothing but positives. And both are equally dull.

What about...X fails the exam, doesn't get the job, starts own company, becomes successful. Or X passes the exam, gets the job, the company fails, X is made redundant.

Both are more interesting as they shift from positive to negative to positive to negative to positive...

You can use this to generate plot ideas. You have your character, their next action can have a positive or negative outcome. Choose one and follow it until you get to the next action. Now swing them in another direction: if they were positive first time round, go negative now. It's all going well - oops, they crash the car. It's all going badly - hey, a win on premium Bonds.

And if you're really, really stuck go for the Terry Pratchett solution: a naked woman bursts into the room carrying a flaming sword.